Hansen's Sunday Notebook: Allonzo Trier returning with hopes of joining Arizona Wildcats greats
- Updated
Star sports columnist Greg Hansen offers his opinion on recent sports news.
- Greg Hansen Arizona Daily Star
- Updated
I think Allonzo Trier chose to return for his junior basketball season for two reasons:
1. He wants to improve his game enough to be a clear first-round draft choice and get his name in the ring of honor at McKale Center;
2. He is eager to work with new associate head coach Lorenzo Romar, an offensive specialist who, if permitted by Sean Miller, can help Trier refine his offensive game, and thus help the Wildcats not get “stuck” so often against zone defenses.
Trier has many pluses as an offensive player: He attacks the rim; he can turn the corner; he’s an exceptional prober of defenses; his step-back jumper is among the best in college basketball; he plays through contact and he plays downhill.
But he also needs to work on being too predictable on his pull-up shots; he needs to be more decisive in knowing when to look for his teammates; and he exposes the ball in traffic too often.
In a lot of ways, Trier and Romar are Arizona’s top recruits for 2017-18. As time goes by, it’s less likely Rawle Alkins and Chance Comanche return.
College basketball has become the most unpredictable game on most campuses. Player movement doesn’t often make sense. At a school like Arizona, roster management has become the as important as figuring out a way to beat UCLA.
- Greg Hansen Arizona Daily Star
- Updated
The NCAA moves in mysterious ways, often tardy, often after much damage has been done.
Last week, for example, the NCAA proposed an early recruiting signing period (December) for football. Had the rule applied in 2016, Arizona’s recruiting class would not have been gutted by Oregon and others.
But for Rich Rodriguez, his successors and all mid-level Power 5 schools, it will help eliminate many of those hellish late-January, early-February poaching periods when top-25 programs fill their final two or three recruiting spots with players cultivated for months by schools such as Arizona, Arizona State, Colorado and Utah.
Sometimes you wonder why the NCAA is so late to change rules that make so much sense. It will also serve to help prevent 18-year-old ballplayers from being strung along by coaches waiting to see if they can get someone better.
In addition to the early signing period, the NCAA acted to eliminate unsafe two-a-day football contact practices. That should’ve been implemented 50 years ago. But because football was viewed as a “tough man’s game,” it took decades for those in higher education to understand that it wasn’t smart to subject a football player to hours of contact drills each August.
Of all the memories from my high school days, the least positive were two-a-day football practices. I got the snot knocked out of me for two hours every morning and two hours every afternoon. I stuck with it because of the camaraderie and peer pressure, but even as a 17-year-old it seemed excessive.
In one brutally hot August stretch, two of my best friends and Logan (Utah) High’s leading players, Dan Roskelley and Kirk Jensen, tore their ACLs, ending their football careers. A third, two-way starter Dave Shipp, broke his collarbone. All in a week’s time.
We weren’t allowed to drink water until practice ended. At the conclusion of each two-a-day, our coach would blow his whistle and shout “Two laps, on the track!”
It’s amazing no one died. Now, four decades later, college football will protect its players’ health.
RichRod will be allowed to start fall training camp one week earlier, with 29 practices, meaning there will be no need for two-a-days. If two-a-days are infrequently held, no-contact and no-conditioning drills will be allowed in the second practice.
It’s also makes sense for Arizona to build an indoor practice facility for football and other uses, such as football tailgating and whatever he athletic department desires.
I lived in Oregon when temperatures soared past 100 for a week or two every summer, but the reason the Ducks and Beavers became the first Pac-12 schools to build indoor facilities was to get out of the rain. Both programs flourished thereafter.
With an indoor facility, Arizona players working out in June and July won’t have to do so outside when it’s too hot. It has been a significant recruiting disadvantage for the Wildcats.
Times change. Fortunately, college football has seen the light.
- Greg Hansen Arizona Daily Star
- Updated
Former Tucson High and Pima College basketball all-star Shakir Smith was named MVP of the Bulgarian EuroLeague last week. Smith, who was an all-conference player at Adams State in Colorado a year ago, averaged 17.9 points for Akadomik of Bulgaria, which finished second in the regular season. Smith’s high school rival at Amphi, Tim Derksen, completed his first year of professional basketball by leading Spain’s Marin Ence with 18.1 points per game in 32 games. Derksen played college basketball at the University of San Francisco. …
- Greg Hansen Arizona Daily Star
- Updated
Amphi freshman softball player Kristiana Watson is hitting a hard-to-believe .762 with 14 home runs for the Panthers through Friday’s games. Kristiana isn’t alone in the up-and-coming talent among Tucson’s younger softball classes. Ironwood Ridge junior third baseman Isabel Pacho, who has already committed to play at Arizona, is hitting .605 with 10 homers, and Tucson High freshman first baseman Carlie Scupin, another Arizona-committed prospect, is hitting .613 with nine homers for the No. 2-ranked Badgers, even though Scupin missed seven games with a back injury. …
- Greg Hansen Arizona Daily Star
- Updated
Coach Kelly Fowler’s perennial softball power at Canyon del Oro is again ranked No. 1 in Class 4A. The 23-4 Dorados last week finished 4-1 in the powerful Carew Invitational in Anaheim, California, and have hit 42 home runs in 27 games. Junior catcher Alexis Kaiser has 13 homers, sophomore Hope Banales is hitting .501, and senior first baseman Ari Acedo is hitting .520. Freshman pitcher Amya Legarra is 11-3 in 93 innings pitched, allowing just 75 hits. CDO is a clear favorite to win its ninth state championship next month. The Class 5A race is Tucson-heavy at the top. Coach Eric Tatham’s Cienega Bobcats are No. 1, Sahuaro is No. 2 and Ironwood Ridge, the defending state champions, are No. 5. Cienega and Rich Alday’s Ironwood Ridge team meet Tuesday in the last week of the regular season. …
- Greg Hansen Arizona Daily Star
- Updated
Pima College concludes its spring football camp this week. Coach Jim Monaco isn’t one to back away from competition. He scheduled a season opener in late August at Trinity Valley College in Texas. Trinity Valley was 11-1 last season and won its ninth bowl game in history, a program stocked with Division I recruits. Monaco has his own Division I prospects — in the last two years, three signed with Oregon State, one with Utah and another TCU. Now comes highly-sought linebacker Bryant Pirtle Jr., who last week was offered a scholarship by Arizona co-offensive coordinator Calvin Magee. But it might be too late; Louisville offered Pirtle a week ago and plans to have a coach at PCC this week in attempt to get a commitment from the 6-foot-3-inch linebacker from — where else? — Louisville. A year ago, Arizona was burned by an ex-PCC receiver, Timmy Hernandez, who caught a touchdown pass in Oregon State’s 42-17 blowout over the Wildcats. Hernandez was an All-ACCAC receiver at Pima who was not recruited by Arizona. …
- Greg Hansen Arizona Daily Star
- Updated
Super Bowl pass rusher Brooks Reed of the Atlanta Falcons will be back in Tucson to be best man at the wedding of Sabino High School teammate Glyndon Bolasky next week. Bolasky, who is now a Pima County deputy, was actually viewed as a better prospect than Reed when they left Sabino 11 years ago. But Bolasky, a running back with elusiveness and speed, tore his knee as an Arizona freshman and couldn’t regain his difference-making burst. Reed went on to become Arizona’s top defensive lineman of the last 10 years. …
- Greg Hansen Arizona Daily Star
- Updated
Arizona volleyball coach Dave Rubio signed Santa Ana (California) Mater Dei High School volleyball standout Gabby Halcovich last week. Sound familiar? Her father, Frank Halcovich, was one of Arizona’s leading baseball recruits of the 1980s. He was the California Junior College Player of the Year in 1985 and 1986, as a pitcher/hitter. At Arizona, he hit .361 with 12 home runs in 1988 and also won seven games as a pitcher, making the All-Pac-10 team. He now owns a commercial lighting company in Southern California. …
- Greg Hansen Arizona Daily Star
- Updated
When CDO senior Turner Washington threw the discus a state record and personal best 217 feet 5 inches last week at California’s Arcadia Invitational, it was the No. 6 throw in American history for high school athletes. By the end of the year, Washington is apt to be considered with Tucson High hurdler Joe Batiste and Amphi sprinter Michael Bates among the three leading track and field athletes in Tucson history. Washington has signed to compete for UA coach Fred Harvey.
- Greg Hansen Arizona Daily Star
- Updated
Pima College first-team NJCAA basketball All-American Deion James of Empire High School is on the recruiting trail. He visited Fresno State last week and is visiting Washington State and Colorado State this week. To help replace James, PCC coach Brian Peabody last week signed Catalina Foothills shooting standout Nik Nehls, son of Arizona’s 1980 All-Pac-10 guard Joe Nehls. Peabody also was successful in his pursuit of Ironwood Ridge athlete Cole Gerken, who might’ve been as good as any high school basketball player in Tucson last season. …
- Greg Hansen Arizona Daily Star
- Updated
In the second game since Arizona softball coach Mike Candrea was selected to the USA Softball Hall of Fame, the 40-1 Wildcats lost at Utah. It was one of the most unexpected losses in Candrea’s distinguished career. The biggest shocker? In March of 1997, the 30-0 Wildcats, building to another national championship with a 61-5 record, lost 3-0 to Oregon State. The Beavers finished 6-21 in the Pac-10. Stuff happens over a long season. …
- Greg Hansen Arizona Daily Star
- Updated
Former Salpointe Catholic and UA baseball pitcher Rich Tomey, son of UA football coach Dick Tomey, left the Arizona Cardinals after more than a dozen years in a front office/marketing capacity. He earlier worked for the Diamondbacks during their 2001 World Championship season. Rich now becomes executive director of the Positive Coaches’ Alliance in Phoenix, a national non-profit group whose mission is to develop “better athletes, better people” through youth and high school sports. Tomey said he plans to expand his program to Southern Arizona. …
- Greg Hansen Arizona Daily Star
- Updated
The game of the week in high school baseball involves Class 4A’s No. 2 team, Salpointe Catholic, against 6A powerhouse Tucson, Friday at 4 p.m., at Salpointe. Coach Danny Preble’s Lancers stunned No. 1 ranked Nogales with a seven-run final inning to win last week in Nogales. Lancers juniors Daniel Durazo and Efrain Cerrantes are hitting .434 and .439, respectively. It will be the final game of the regular season before the Lancers and Badgers begin pursuit of state championships. …
- Greg Hansen Arizona Daily Star
- Updated
Games of the Week, college division: Jay Johnson’s Arizona baseball team plays ex-Wildcat Bill Kinneberg’s Utah club Thursday through Saturday night at Hi Corbett Field. That series could draw 15,000. The UA softball team plays Oregon Friday through Sunday at Hillenbrand Stadium. All games are likely sellouts, or about 8,000 total fans. The UA baseball/softball weekend could top 20,000 fans. That’d probably be a record.
- Greg Hansen Arizona Daily Star
- Updated
In its effort to replace Dave Heeke as its athletic director, Central Michigan has selected 16 people to serve on a search committee. It includes students and faculty, those who probably wouldn’t know a capable AD if he or she walked into their living room.
It’s not the best way of doing business. When Arizona President Peter Likins searched for an AD to replace Jim Livengood in 2010, he told former NCAA executive director Cedric Dempsey to “go find me an athletic director.”
As a committee of one, Dempsey hand-picked Greg Byrne. And when Byrne left, UA President Ann Weaver Hart appointed Dempsey and ex-UA associate AD Rocky LaRose to find a replacement.
They found Heeke in almost record time, which, in retrospect, was a no-brainer.
Some schools aren’t as resourceful.
I think Allonzo Trier chose to return for his junior basketball season for two reasons:
1. He wants to improve his game enough to be a clear first-round draft choice and get his name in the ring of honor at McKale Center;
2. He is eager to work with new associate head coach Lorenzo Romar, an offensive specialist who, if permitted by Sean Miller, can help Trier refine his offensive game, and thus help the Wildcats not get “stuck” so often against zone defenses.
Trier has many pluses as an offensive player: He attacks the rim; he can turn the corner; he’s an exceptional prober of defenses; his step-back jumper is among the best in college basketball; he plays through contact and he plays downhill.
But he also needs to work on being too predictable on his pull-up shots; he needs to be more decisive in knowing when to look for his teammates; and he exposes the ball in traffic too often.
In a lot of ways, Trier and Romar are Arizona’s top recruits for 2017-18. As time goes by, it’s less likely Rawle Alkins and Chance Comanche return.
College basketball has become the most unpredictable game on most campuses. Player movement doesn’t often make sense. At a school like Arizona, roster management has become the as important as figuring out a way to beat UCLA.
The NCAA moves in mysterious ways, often tardy, often after much damage has been done.
Last week, for example, the NCAA proposed an early recruiting signing period (December) for football. Had the rule applied in 2016, Arizona’s recruiting class would not have been gutted by Oregon and others.
But for Rich Rodriguez, his successors and all mid-level Power 5 schools, it will help eliminate many of those hellish late-January, early-February poaching periods when top-25 programs fill their final two or three recruiting spots with players cultivated for months by schools such as Arizona, Arizona State, Colorado and Utah.
Sometimes you wonder why the NCAA is so late to change rules that make so much sense. It will also serve to help prevent 18-year-old ballplayers from being strung along by coaches waiting to see if they can get someone better.
In addition to the early signing period, the NCAA acted to eliminate unsafe two-a-day football contact practices. That should’ve been implemented 50 years ago. But because football was viewed as a “tough man’s game,” it took decades for those in higher education to understand that it wasn’t smart to subject a football player to hours of contact drills each August.
Of all the memories from my high school days, the least positive were two-a-day football practices. I got the snot knocked out of me for two hours every morning and two hours every afternoon. I stuck with it because of the camaraderie and peer pressure, but even as a 17-year-old it seemed excessive.
In one brutally hot August stretch, two of my best friends and Logan (Utah) High’s leading players, Dan Roskelley and Kirk Jensen, tore their ACLs, ending their football careers. A third, two-way starter Dave Shipp, broke his collarbone. All in a week’s time.
We weren’t allowed to drink water until practice ended. At the conclusion of each two-a-day, our coach would blow his whistle and shout “Two laps, on the track!”
It’s amazing no one died. Now, four decades later, college football will protect its players’ health.
RichRod will be allowed to start fall training camp one week earlier, with 29 practices, meaning there will be no need for two-a-days. If two-a-days are infrequently held, no-contact and no-conditioning drills will be allowed in the second practice.
It’s also makes sense for Arizona to build an indoor practice facility for football and other uses, such as football tailgating and whatever he athletic department desires.
I lived in Oregon when temperatures soared past 100 for a week or two every summer, but the reason the Ducks and Beavers became the first Pac-12 schools to build indoor facilities was to get out of the rain. Both programs flourished thereafter.
With an indoor facility, Arizona players working out in June and July won’t have to do so outside when it’s too hot. It has been a significant recruiting disadvantage for the Wildcats.
Times change. Fortunately, college football has seen the light.
Former Tucson High and Pima College basketball all-star Shakir Smith was named MVP of the Bulgarian EuroLeague last week. Smith, who was an all-conference player at Adams State in Colorado a year ago, averaged 17.9 points for Akadomik of Bulgaria, which finished second in the regular season. Smith’s high school rival at Amphi, Tim Derksen, completed his first year of professional basketball by leading Spain’s Marin Ence with 18.1 points per game in 32 games. Derksen played college basketball at the University of San Francisco. …
Amphi freshman softball player Kristiana Watson is hitting a hard-to-believe .762 with 14 home runs for the Panthers through Friday’s games. Kristiana isn’t alone in the up-and-coming talent among Tucson’s younger softball classes. Ironwood Ridge junior third baseman Isabel Pacho, who has already committed to play at Arizona, is hitting .605 with 10 homers, and Tucson High freshman first baseman Carlie Scupin, another Arizona-committed prospect, is hitting .613 with nine homers for the No. 2-ranked Badgers, even though Scupin missed seven games with a back injury. …
Coach Kelly Fowler’s perennial softball power at Canyon del Oro is again ranked No. 1 in Class 4A. The 23-4 Dorados last week finished 4-1 in the powerful Carew Invitational in Anaheim, California, and have hit 42 home runs in 27 games. Junior catcher Alexis Kaiser has 13 homers, sophomore Hope Banales is hitting .501, and senior first baseman Ari Acedo is hitting .520. Freshman pitcher Amya Legarra is 11-3 in 93 innings pitched, allowing just 75 hits. CDO is a clear favorite to win its ninth state championship next month. The Class 5A race is Tucson-heavy at the top. Coach Eric Tatham’s Cienega Bobcats are No. 1, Sahuaro is No. 2 and Ironwood Ridge, the defending state champions, are No. 5. Cienega and Rich Alday’s Ironwood Ridge team meet Tuesday in the last week of the regular season. …
Pima College concludes its spring football camp this week. Coach Jim Monaco isn’t one to back away from competition. He scheduled a season opener in late August at Trinity Valley College in Texas. Trinity Valley was 11-1 last season and won its ninth bowl game in history, a program stocked with Division I recruits. Monaco has his own Division I prospects — in the last two years, three signed with Oregon State, one with Utah and another TCU. Now comes highly-sought linebacker Bryant Pirtle Jr., who last week was offered a scholarship by Arizona co-offensive coordinator Calvin Magee. But it might be too late; Louisville offered Pirtle a week ago and plans to have a coach at PCC this week in attempt to get a commitment from the 6-foot-3-inch linebacker from — where else? — Louisville. A year ago, Arizona was burned by an ex-PCC receiver, Timmy Hernandez, who caught a touchdown pass in Oregon State’s 42-17 blowout over the Wildcats. Hernandez was an All-ACCAC receiver at Pima who was not recruited by Arizona. …
Super Bowl pass rusher Brooks Reed of the Atlanta Falcons will be back in Tucson to be best man at the wedding of Sabino High School teammate Glyndon Bolasky next week. Bolasky, who is now a Pima County deputy, was actually viewed as a better prospect than Reed when they left Sabino 11 years ago. But Bolasky, a running back with elusiveness and speed, tore his knee as an Arizona freshman and couldn’t regain his difference-making burst. Reed went on to become Arizona’s top defensive lineman of the last 10 years. …
Arizona volleyball coach Dave Rubio signed Santa Ana (California) Mater Dei High School volleyball standout Gabby Halcovich last week. Sound familiar? Her father, Frank Halcovich, was one of Arizona’s leading baseball recruits of the 1980s. He was the California Junior College Player of the Year in 1985 and 1986, as a pitcher/hitter. At Arizona, he hit .361 with 12 home runs in 1988 and also won seven games as a pitcher, making the All-Pac-10 team. He now owns a commercial lighting company in Southern California. …
When CDO senior Turner Washington threw the discus a state record and personal best 217 feet 5 inches last week at California’s Arcadia Invitational, it was the No. 6 throw in American history for high school athletes. By the end of the year, Washington is apt to be considered with Tucson High hurdler Joe Batiste and Amphi sprinter Michael Bates among the three leading track and field athletes in Tucson history. Washington has signed to compete for UA coach Fred Harvey.
Pima College first-team NJCAA basketball All-American Deion James of Empire High School is on the recruiting trail. He visited Fresno State last week and is visiting Washington State and Colorado State this week. To help replace James, PCC coach Brian Peabody last week signed Catalina Foothills shooting standout Nik Nehls, son of Arizona’s 1980 All-Pac-10 guard Joe Nehls. Peabody also was successful in his pursuit of Ironwood Ridge athlete Cole Gerken, who might’ve been as good as any high school basketball player in Tucson last season. …
In the second game since Arizona softball coach Mike Candrea was selected to the USA Softball Hall of Fame, the 40-1 Wildcats lost at Utah. It was one of the most unexpected losses in Candrea’s distinguished career. The biggest shocker? In March of 1997, the 30-0 Wildcats, building to another national championship with a 61-5 record, lost 3-0 to Oregon State. The Beavers finished 6-21 in the Pac-10. Stuff happens over a long season. …
Former Salpointe Catholic and UA baseball pitcher Rich Tomey, son of UA football coach Dick Tomey, left the Arizona Cardinals after more than a dozen years in a front office/marketing capacity. He earlier worked for the Diamondbacks during their 2001 World Championship season. Rich now becomes executive director of the Positive Coaches’ Alliance in Phoenix, a national non-profit group whose mission is to develop “better athletes, better people” through youth and high school sports. Tomey said he plans to expand his program to Southern Arizona. …
The game of the week in high school baseball involves Class 4A’s No. 2 team, Salpointe Catholic, against 6A powerhouse Tucson, Friday at 4 p.m., at Salpointe. Coach Danny Preble’s Lancers stunned No. 1 ranked Nogales with a seven-run final inning to win last week in Nogales. Lancers juniors Daniel Durazo and Efrain Cerrantes are hitting .434 and .439, respectively. It will be the final game of the regular season before the Lancers and Badgers begin pursuit of state championships. …
Games of the Week, college division: Jay Johnson’s Arizona baseball team plays ex-Wildcat Bill Kinneberg’s Utah club Thursday through Saturday night at Hi Corbett Field. That series could draw 15,000. The UA softball team plays Oregon Friday through Sunday at Hillenbrand Stadium. All games are likely sellouts, or about 8,000 total fans. The UA baseball/softball weekend could top 20,000 fans. That’d probably be a record.
In its effort to replace Dave Heeke as its athletic director, Central Michigan has selected 16 people to serve on a search committee. It includes students and faculty, those who probably wouldn’t know a capable AD if he or she walked into their living room.
It’s not the best way of doing business. When Arizona President Peter Likins searched for an AD to replace Jim Livengood in 2010, he told former NCAA executive director Cedric Dempsey to “go find me an athletic director.”
As a committee of one, Dempsey hand-picked Greg Byrne. And when Byrne left, UA President Ann Weaver Hart appointed Dempsey and ex-UA associate AD Rocky LaRose to find a replacement.
They found Heeke in almost record time, which, in retrospect, was a no-brainer.
Some schools aren’t as resourceful.
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